johnridley | DealExtreme taillight review (Reply)

DealExtreme recently started carrying a bicycle taillight that looks like a clone of the Planet Bike Superflash. The Superflash is kind of the gold standard for affordable taillights. At less than $20 (for the Superflash), it's one of the most effective lights out there. While it can't compete with lights like the Dinotte 140L or 200R, those are $100 to $200 taillights; well worth the cost IMO but we have to keep in mind that few people are ready to pay that kind of money for a taillight, and it's best to have suggestions when people want to buy a light.

The new light from DealExtreme is $3.54, shipped. How well does it compare?

All photos were taken with freshly charged identical NiMH AAA cells in both lights.

Here's the light. As you can see, it looks a lot like the Superflash. The reflector area actually looks like a retroreflector, which differs (in a good way) from the Superflash, which doesn't really have a proper reflector.

The bracket is fine. Very much comparable to the Superflash. I thought it was loose at first but I just hadn't snapped it all the way in place.

EDIT: The bracket is pretty much interchangeable with the Superflash. Both will fit in each other's bracket, though when you put the DX into the SF bracket, it takes a little extra push to get it to click locked.

Another view showing the rubber covered on/off switch, on the top instead of on the bottom as with the Superflash.

Cover off. Waterproofing is about the same as the superflash. The gasket feels a little softer so it MIGHT be a bit better than the superflash's harder plastic, but it doesn't really look more than weather resistant to me.

This is with both lights OFF - taken with flash to show the effectiveness of the reflectors. The lights are on top of the trunk of my car, with the DX light on the left, Superflash on the right. Neither of them are nearly as reflective as the reflectors on the car, but the DX light is much more reflective than the Superflash, which really doesn't have a reflector at all, just something that looks kind of like a reflector but which doesn't really work.

Light patterns projected on a white garage door, again, DX on left, SF on right. The SF has a more regular pattern, the DX light, especially on the bottom two lights, are not diffused at all, if you know LEDs, that's what a clear LED looks like when not diffused. Total brightness is probably higher out of the Superflash, though it's highly concentrated in the center of the beam.

Here's a video showing the flash modes, then from about 60 feet away, straight on, 10 and 20 degrees off center.

Bottom line is that the Superflash is definitely brighter, but ONLY right on axis. If you get very far to the side at all, the DX light becomes about as bright, and very far off axis, the DX light is brighter.

Here's a link to the item on DX. I think that if you wanted to put multiple lights on your bike, or if you wanted to throw some lights in your bag to hand out to ninjas, at $3.54 each shipped this would be an EXCELLENT choice.

If you're going to put the light on a strap or backpack, this is probably a better choice than the Superflash, because of the better off-axis performance.

EDIT: RUNTIME:
I've left it running for 60 hours now, it's still blinking brightly, but it has dimmed a bit. I moved it to steady mode and took these two photos.

Edit 2: OK, it's at 86 hours now, and the battery voltage has dropped below 1 volt per cell. NiMH cells shouldn't go below 0.95 volts per cell so I'm stopping the test and saying about 90 hours is the runtime in flash mode 1.